On Thursday, Jim Jordan’s Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government kicked off its first hearing. But it’s clear from the name that the entire premise for the subcommittee’s work is a non-starter. If the federal government was weaponized against conservatives, Donald Trump would be in a federal prison. There would not be a Trump-appointed U.S. Attorney still in place in Delaware, investigating Hunter Biden. Chris Wray, a longtime Republican who served as a high-ranking DOJ official during the Bush administration and was appointed Director of the FBI by Trump, would not still hold that position. And so on. You get the point.
Absolutely loved Daniel Goldman's dismantling of Gym Jordan on Thursday. It was a delicious dessert, and Jordan was obviously filleted & barbecued. Hope to see more of that to come. Joyce, you were a fixture on MSNBC today. Hope you get some rest. Carry on.
I can't help but think that much of the Tea Party-MAGA trend is about anti-intellectualism. No wonder these are the folks who take on school boards, local politics, and Congress. They are ignoramuses who are acting out their perceived inferiority. Little do they know they are evidence of their own worst fears.
They are actually actively wanting to create ignoramuses and why all the tearing down of what can be taught and banning of books. An educated society is a natural check on the government - something Hitler and the MAGA do not want.
Hmmm... totally agree about educated society, but, 'wanting to create ignoramuses,' I wonder. Even they probably want industry to have able workers. They just want to decide what people need to know and still serve society. It is the banning, micromanaging, curriculum selection from big brother, lack of greater-good purpose that gets my blouse all in a twist.
I'm wondering if acting the ignoramus is not a pretty effective strategy... they are in control, they now hold the levers of power... and they got there by saying stupid nonsense.
Are people receptive to anti-intellectualism because they feel looked-down-upon by educated people who seem to understand this complicated world?
Hope, you may have opened a discussion that has promise of finding at least a partial solution on how do mend the divide.
Consider the possibility that they're acting out of their perceived *superiority* (which may indeed, and often does, conceal feelings of inferiority). They believe, or profess to believe, or want to believe, that their God is on their side, so their side is right (in more ways than one). Their conviction of their own superiority is of course bound up with white superiority and good ol' "traditional family values," where men are men and women are women and each sex has its assigned role in the social order.
Their attempts to control what gets taught and published and carried in public libraries are consistent with the way religious institutions have often acted to enforce their teachings. Anti-intellectualism is definitely a factor, because conservative religious institutions are almost invariably hostile to free thinking (talk to Galileo about that) because free thinking (and observation) generally leads to questioning religious authority. Likewise, a pluralistic, multicultural society questions the underpinnings of white supremacy so we can't have that either.
Max E's comment implied these new conservative leaders' behavior is strictly a strategy to grab power... and the followers simply sheep. Have you rejected these notions?
Hubris seems involved in most human folly... which I have read is increasing, because of modern parenting, that want the child to have high self-confidence and never feel badly. Interesting unforeseen dilemma.
We all struggle with the rapid pace of change, traditional values slipping away replace by another value. If we were able to have a conversation about FACTS - VALUES - DESTINY, we may not be on this water slide into the dogma pool.
Anytime we take sides, try to defend a value we get into arguments... mostly because values have an inner and an outer component... both need to be considered.
The followers are no more or less "sheep" than, say, members of an orchestra are sheep: they're being effectively played by their leaders. And these "conservative leaders" aren't exactly new. It's easy to trace them back to Newt Gingrich in the 1990s, and not hard to follow the thread back to the Reagan administration and thence to Nixon's southern strategy. They were around before then, but they weren't united under the GOP umbrella. Many of them were Southern Democrats.
I don't know what goes on at the highest echelons, meaning among mostly corporate interests and very big money, but I can't help noticing where the funding for right-wing/Republican enterprises comes from (at least the portion of it that's visible to the public). So I suspect that this orchestra's conductors are being played too, and that they, like the orchestra's members, are getting enough of what they want to make it worthwhile.
I see something afoot here, Joyce. Something good. While the Weaponization Committee may self-destruct under the weight of its own deceit, the White House took another smart step after Biden's triumph at the SOTU Tuesday night. At his appearance in Florida to continue highlighting GOP intentions to gut Social Security and Medicare, everyone in the audience had on their seat a print-out of Sen. Rick Scott's plan to do just that. THAT is smart politics. This small gesture doesn't just bring the issue to those in the seats, but to American's reading about this bold move in the papers and on the news. Taking the fight TO the GOP is, IMHO, much too long overdue.
Patience is a finite resource. Eventually people run out of it and then action is taken. I’m done with patience and am awaiting action. Apathy is always an option, but I choose not to go down that path.
I wish I still could believe there is still a statistically significant number of Americans who actually want to think critically about what the people they elected are doing to democracy. Every time I hear the media refer to the MAGA as far right or fringe, I despair. The false narrative that the Republicans who are complicit by their silence and passivity are not MAGA is a false equivalency. In 2022 midterms, democracy survived mostly by extremely thin margins. What that really means is there is slightly less than 50% of the voters who want MTG, Lauren Boebert, Matt Gaetz and Trump to be in power over everyone in the US. With the continued silence by Fani, Jack and Merrick, chances for sanity and the rule of law to prevail dissipate.
I do not believe there are significant numbers of Americans who cannot think for themselves. We are living in a quagmire of competing contradictions so profound that fear mobilizes many but although we won a slim majority in the Senate, Republicans are tearing down their own House day by day. We all know this. We who understand this remain vigilant and nonjudgmental in our path forward. Democracy is fragile and we must carry the torch in whatever way we can to enlighten others and as we build our alliances we will prevail. It is our legacy if we truly want it.
It's somewhat like Goldhagen described in Hitler's Willing Executioners: "Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust is a 1996 book by American writer Daniel Goldhagen, in which he argues that the vast majority of ordinary Germans were "willing executioners" in the Holocaust because of a unique and virulent "eliminationist antisemitism" in German political culture which had developed in the preceding centuries. Goldhagen argues that eliminationist antisemitism was the cornerstone of German national identity, was unique to Germany, and because of it ordinary German conscripts killed Jews willingly. Goldhagen asserts that this mentality grew out of medieval attitudes rooted in religion and was later secularized." - Wikipedia
I could watch Dan Goldman all day long. He's brilliant! "Weaponization of Government." In the past 24 hours, I have read that DeSantis got the FL lege to approve continuation of the program to fly immigrants to northern cities. This comes just 10 weeks after the Martha's Vinyard debacle. Also in the past 24 hours, I have learned that DeSantis has changed the Disney rules so that HE selects their supervisors now (not Disney). Also in the past 24 hours, I learned that DeSantis wanted to ban guns from his innaugural festivities, but demanded that he not be named/blamed as the source of the ban. Where's the outrage? Do people really think he's better than t****? We are bad at looking ahead. Why are we always reactive when we need to be proactive? He's testing his playbook in FL so he's ready to do it nationally as president. Literally anybody would be better than frat boy!! I'll hop down from the soapbox now...
I remember when the John Birch Society was a fringe right wing group devoted to impeaching Earl Warren. Americans used to see their billboards and newspaper ads and snicker. Well, the lunatics are running the asylum now, and they got there by the votes of the American people. It's pathetic.
Not all of them. Let’s not forget the tens of millions of votes received by the orange shit gibbon in two elections. It is impossible to deny that the electorate is responsible for the quality of its representatives. Boebert and Greene and Gaetz were all re-elected.
True, but gerrymandering is huge in states such as Florida and Texas, both of which would be much more purple if they hadn't been "redistricted" by Republicans.
Thanks Joyce and everyone for their comments. This committee is weaponizing government for the sole purpose to keep the GOP out of jail, including Jordan, Gaetz and of course Trump. In fact this committee probably was Trumps idea working with “I don’t recall” Jordan. What filth!
Joyce, thank you for focusing not only the “what” of this absurd subcommittee, but the “why” it has been created by R’s, and why important it is for us to have civil discourse- we need legitimate governance.
A rhetorical question if there ever was one especially for us “choir” followers of “preacher” JV.
A few other thoughts:
First, even with the 12 to 8 advantages in subcommittee membership, Jordan and GOP company are no match for Plaskett, Goldman, Raskin and Demo company. Biases aside, the latter folks made the former folks look like the "gang of fools" that they are on the opening day of who’s got the weaponization.
Second, just as everyone knows that Trump had been weaponing the DOJ since his first day in office, and that Barr should have been impeached for his egregious behavior while in office, how can anyone take this subcommittee seriously especially when Jordan its chair was a co-conspirator in the insurrection at a minimum, and hopefully, will shortly be among those indicted for these and other criminal offenses. Time will tell and its rapidly running out as we all know.
Third, while Fox will cherry pick the “kettle calling the pot black” weaponizing hearings for their devoted followers, I do not think that these folks (and even the Dems for that matter) really care all that much about these performative GOP subcommittees.
I base this on the midterm exit polls that showed 90 percent of the GOP and 90 percent of the Demos voted straight party ticket and did not split their votes. What made the difference was that the Independents for the first time in recent history voted slightly in favor of the in-power Demos when traditionally they vote for the out-of-power party by a significant majority. Thus, they are the ones that can and should be talked to if you can find them.
Here in the Ann Arbor bubble where I live, there are a few independents (one ran for mayor in 2022 and received 25% of the vote against a three-time incumbent Demo). There are virtually no Republicans of any consequence in my neighborhood as our mayor, 12 council members, state, and national representatives are all Democrats. The same is pretty much true of Detroit. Of course, there is the rest of Michigan which is purple or “bi-political” you might say.
Fourth, and hopefully soon before it’s too late, the DOJ and/or Georgia will indict Trump and company for their litany of activities surrounding January 6, and then, these GOP subcommittees will be even more of a side show than they already are.
I grew up in the Pee Dee area of South Carolina in the 1950s. Definitely one of the most racist areas in the State. I remember KKK rallies, the Black and White water fountains in Sears and much else. People forget that Briggs vs Elliott in Maning, an hours drive from where I grew up, was the real basis for Brown vs Board. Brown was the case before the Court as I understand it because they thought an old South case would have been too inflammatory, as if Kansas were any different. The Orangeburg massacre, that ended then Governor Robert McNair’s political career, was just down the road. It is hard to believe we are going back in time so fast. I saw a photo of Boebert yesterday wearing a “Don’t tread on me hat” which is possibly even worse than a confederate flag if you know the history of the Gadsden Flag. I don’t know why I wrote this other than to say this was all in my lifetime. To reach back even more in time, I knew three great aunts well that knew people that fought in the Civil War. Nothing is more appalling than the current republicans. Do they really think the South’s, and much of the Midwest’s appalling history, is not relevant and is to be ignored and did not contribute to our appalling wealth distribution, education distribution and much else and the government should have no role? If Garland does not wake-up and prosecute trump’s crimes, we are going to have to crawl out of the Dark Ages again. People probably disagree with me but I think people should honor the subpoenas, show up with bells on, and make MAGA eat it with their testimony. The tables can be turned and should be.
Thank you, Joyce for this clear-eyed and neatly articulated overview of the “select committee.” Personally, I wish Jim (Gym!) and friends every success in convincing a majority of voters that they are despicable, power-hungry fools who have no interest in actually governing. So far, it looks like they’re well in their way.
It is frustrating to write my Congressman. get a response a couple of months later which ignores the points that I made as well as my questions. Nevertheless, I continue to beat my head against a brick wall hoping for different results.
Evening Joyce. It has been a very positive week for dems. Thank you for your thoughts today. How fortunate we all are. It is a privilege to be here to make sense of the often nonsensical events that emerge but you inspire every day.
Such a fine column, Joyce, that actually points the way to that elusive goal of actually having civil discourse among those of different political persuasions. My challenge is to actually find those of different political persuasions, since I have painted myself into the corner of an echo chamber.
Absolutely loved Daniel Goldman's dismantling of Gym Jordan on Thursday. It was a delicious dessert, and Jordan was obviously filleted & barbecued. Hope to see more of that to come. Joyce, you were a fixture on MSNBC today. Hope you get some rest. Carry on.
I can't help but think that much of the Tea Party-MAGA trend is about anti-intellectualism. No wonder these are the folks who take on school boards, local politics, and Congress. They are ignoramuses who are acting out their perceived inferiority. Little do they know they are evidence of their own worst fears.
They are actually actively wanting to create ignoramuses and why all the tearing down of what can be taught and banning of books. An educated society is a natural check on the government - something Hitler and the MAGA do not want.
Hmmm... totally agree about educated society, but, 'wanting to create ignoramuses,' I wonder. Even they probably want industry to have able workers. They just want to decide what people need to know and still serve society. It is the banning, micromanaging, curriculum selection from big brother, lack of greater-good purpose that gets my blouse all in a twist.
I'm wondering if acting the ignoramus is not a pretty effective strategy... they are in control, they now hold the levers of power... and they got there by saying stupid nonsense.
Are people receptive to anti-intellectualism because they feel looked-down-upon by educated people who seem to understand this complicated world?
Hope, you may have opened a discussion that has promise of finding at least a partial solution on how do mend the divide.
That would be an honor. Thank you for your kind words, Lynn.
Consider the possibility that they're acting out of their perceived *superiority* (which may indeed, and often does, conceal feelings of inferiority). They believe, or profess to believe, or want to believe, that their God is on their side, so their side is right (in more ways than one). Their conviction of their own superiority is of course bound up with white superiority and good ol' "traditional family values," where men are men and women are women and each sex has its assigned role in the social order.
Their attempts to control what gets taught and published and carried in public libraries are consistent with the way religious institutions have often acted to enforce their teachings. Anti-intellectualism is definitely a factor, because conservative religious institutions are almost invariably hostile to free thinking (talk to Galileo about that) because free thinking (and observation) generally leads to questioning religious authority. Likewise, a pluralistic, multicultural society questions the underpinnings of white supremacy so we can't have that either.
Max E's comment implied these new conservative leaders' behavior is strictly a strategy to grab power... and the followers simply sheep. Have you rejected these notions?
Hubris seems involved in most human folly... which I have read is increasing, because of modern parenting, that want the child to have high self-confidence and never feel badly. Interesting unforeseen dilemma.
We all struggle with the rapid pace of change, traditional values slipping away replace by another value. If we were able to have a conversation about FACTS - VALUES - DESTINY, we may not be on this water slide into the dogma pool.
Anytime we take sides, try to defend a value we get into arguments... mostly because values have an inner and an outer component... both need to be considered.
The followers are no more or less "sheep" than, say, members of an orchestra are sheep: they're being effectively played by their leaders. And these "conservative leaders" aren't exactly new. It's easy to trace them back to Newt Gingrich in the 1990s, and not hard to follow the thread back to the Reagan administration and thence to Nixon's southern strategy. They were around before then, but they weren't united under the GOP umbrella. Many of them were Southern Democrats.
I don't know what goes on at the highest echelons, meaning among mostly corporate interests and very big money, but I can't help noticing where the funding for right-wing/Republican enterprises comes from (at least the portion of it that's visible to the public). So I suspect that this orchestra's conductors are being played too, and that they, like the orchestra's members, are getting enough of what they want to make it worthwhile.
Absolutely and continue to keep up the great work!!!!!
Yes indeed “carry on” and more of the Daniel Goldman type of dismantling would be so great too!!! 👍
I loved Goldman’s work as well. He is a marvel 👏
Hopefully, his own will cannibalize Jordan. That would justify paying them for their time in office.
Hahaha love “gym” kudos. Amen.
I see something afoot here, Joyce. Something good. While the Weaponization Committee may self-destruct under the weight of its own deceit, the White House took another smart step after Biden's triumph at the SOTU Tuesday night. At his appearance in Florida to continue highlighting GOP intentions to gut Social Security and Medicare, everyone in the audience had on their seat a print-out of Sen. Rick Scott's plan to do just that. THAT is smart politics. This small gesture doesn't just bring the issue to those in the seats, but to American's reading about this bold move in the papers and on the news. Taking the fight TO the GOP is, IMHO, much too long overdue.
Until we have prosecution, conviction, and confinement we have no consequences. Until we have consequences, this is all political theater.
I believe that is true but this substack read is about civil discourse and responsible civil action.
After due process of law, when they have been declared traitors, ship them all off to Russia, retract their US citizenship.
Patience is a finite resource. Eventually people run out of it and then action is taken. I’m done with patience and am awaiting action. Apathy is always an option, but I choose not to go down that path.
I wish I still could believe there is still a statistically significant number of Americans who actually want to think critically about what the people they elected are doing to democracy. Every time I hear the media refer to the MAGA as far right or fringe, I despair. The false narrative that the Republicans who are complicit by their silence and passivity are not MAGA is a false equivalency. In 2022 midterms, democracy survived mostly by extremely thin margins. What that really means is there is slightly less than 50% of the voters who want MTG, Lauren Boebert, Matt Gaetz and Trump to be in power over everyone in the US. With the continued silence by Fani, Jack and Merrick, chances for sanity and the rule of law to prevail dissipate.
I do not believe there are significant numbers of Americans who cannot think for themselves. We are living in a quagmire of competing contradictions so profound that fear mobilizes many but although we won a slim majority in the Senate, Republicans are tearing down their own House day by day. We all know this. We who understand this remain vigilant and nonjudgmental in our path forward. Democracy is fragile and we must carry the torch in whatever way we can to enlighten others and as we build our alliances we will prevail. It is our legacy if we truly want it.
It's somewhat like Goldhagen described in Hitler's Willing Executioners: "Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust is a 1996 book by American writer Daniel Goldhagen, in which he argues that the vast majority of ordinary Germans were "willing executioners" in the Holocaust because of a unique and virulent "eliminationist antisemitism" in German political culture which had developed in the preceding centuries. Goldhagen argues that eliminationist antisemitism was the cornerstone of German national identity, was unique to Germany, and because of it ordinary German conscripts killed Jews willingly. Goldhagen asserts that this mentality grew out of medieval attitudes rooted in religion and was later secularized." - Wikipedia
I could watch Dan Goldman all day long. He's brilliant! "Weaponization of Government." In the past 24 hours, I have read that DeSantis got the FL lege to approve continuation of the program to fly immigrants to northern cities. This comes just 10 weeks after the Martha's Vinyard debacle. Also in the past 24 hours, I have learned that DeSantis has changed the Disney rules so that HE selects their supervisors now (not Disney). Also in the past 24 hours, I learned that DeSantis wanted to ban guns from his innaugural festivities, but demanded that he not be named/blamed as the source of the ban. Where's the outrage? Do people really think he's better than t****? We are bad at looking ahead. Why are we always reactive when we need to be proactive? He's testing his playbook in FL so he's ready to do it nationally as president. Literally anybody would be better than frat boy!! I'll hop down from the soapbox now...
I remember when the John Birch Society was a fringe right wing group devoted to impeaching Earl Warren. Americans used to see their billboards and newspaper ads and snicker. Well, the lunatics are running the asylum now, and they got there by the votes of the American people. It's pathetic.
You mean they got there by gerrymandered votes.
Not all of them. Let’s not forget the tens of millions of votes received by the orange shit gibbon in two elections. It is impossible to deny that the electorate is responsible for the quality of its representatives. Boebert and Greene and Gaetz were all re-elected.
True, but gerrymandering is huge in states such as Florida and Texas, both of which would be much more purple if they hadn't been "redistricted" by Republicans.
Exactly. I’d add Ohio to the list of gerrymandered states. Check out the convoluted shape of Jim Jordan’s district.
This one's a keeper, Joyce, for helping us to highlight the nonsense coming from the House Majority. Thank you!
Thanks Joyce and everyone for their comments. This committee is weaponizing government for the sole purpose to keep the GOP out of jail, including Jordan, Gaetz and of course Trump. In fact this committee probably was Trumps idea working with “I don’t recall” Jordan. What filth!
Joyce, thank you for focusing not only the “what” of this absurd subcommittee, but the “why” it has been created by R’s, and why important it is for us to have civil discourse- we need legitimate governance.
A rhetorical question if there ever was one especially for us “choir” followers of “preacher” JV.
A few other thoughts:
First, even with the 12 to 8 advantages in subcommittee membership, Jordan and GOP company are no match for Plaskett, Goldman, Raskin and Demo company. Biases aside, the latter folks made the former folks look like the "gang of fools" that they are on the opening day of who’s got the weaponization.
Second, just as everyone knows that Trump had been weaponing the DOJ since his first day in office, and that Barr should have been impeached for his egregious behavior while in office, how can anyone take this subcommittee seriously especially when Jordan its chair was a co-conspirator in the insurrection at a minimum, and hopefully, will shortly be among those indicted for these and other criminal offenses. Time will tell and its rapidly running out as we all know.
Third, while Fox will cherry pick the “kettle calling the pot black” weaponizing hearings for their devoted followers, I do not think that these folks (and even the Dems for that matter) really care all that much about these performative GOP subcommittees.
I base this on the midterm exit polls that showed 90 percent of the GOP and 90 percent of the Demos voted straight party ticket and did not split their votes. What made the difference was that the Independents for the first time in recent history voted slightly in favor of the in-power Demos when traditionally they vote for the out-of-power party by a significant majority. Thus, they are the ones that can and should be talked to if you can find them.
Here in the Ann Arbor bubble where I live, there are a few independents (one ran for mayor in 2022 and received 25% of the vote against a three-time incumbent Demo). There are virtually no Republicans of any consequence in my neighborhood as our mayor, 12 council members, state, and national representatives are all Democrats. The same is pretty much true of Detroit. Of course, there is the rest of Michigan which is purple or “bi-political” you might say.
Fourth, and hopefully soon before it’s too late, the DOJ and/or Georgia will indict Trump and company for their litany of activities surrounding January 6, and then, these GOP subcommittees will be even more of a side show than they already are.
I grew up in the Pee Dee area of South Carolina in the 1950s. Definitely one of the most racist areas in the State. I remember KKK rallies, the Black and White water fountains in Sears and much else. People forget that Briggs vs Elliott in Maning, an hours drive from where I grew up, was the real basis for Brown vs Board. Brown was the case before the Court as I understand it because they thought an old South case would have been too inflammatory, as if Kansas were any different. The Orangeburg massacre, that ended then Governor Robert McNair’s political career, was just down the road. It is hard to believe we are going back in time so fast. I saw a photo of Boebert yesterday wearing a “Don’t tread on me hat” which is possibly even worse than a confederate flag if you know the history of the Gadsden Flag. I don’t know why I wrote this other than to say this was all in my lifetime. To reach back even more in time, I knew three great aunts well that knew people that fought in the Civil War. Nothing is more appalling than the current republicans. Do they really think the South’s, and much of the Midwest’s appalling history, is not relevant and is to be ignored and did not contribute to our appalling wealth distribution, education distribution and much else and the government should have no role? If Garland does not wake-up and prosecute trump’s crimes, we are going to have to crawl out of the Dark Ages again. People probably disagree with me but I think people should honor the subpoenas, show up with bells on, and make MAGA eat it with their testimony. The tables can be turned and should be.
Manning - apologies, I am a terrible proof reader.
Thank you, Joyce for this clear-eyed and neatly articulated overview of the “select committee.” Personally, I wish Jim (Gym!) and friends every success in convincing a majority of voters that they are despicable, power-hungry fools who have no interest in actually governing. So far, it looks like they’re well in their way.
It is frustrating to write my Congressman. get a response a couple of months later which ignores the points that I made as well as my questions. Nevertheless, I continue to beat my head against a brick wall hoping for different results.
Professor Vance, I am glad that your take on the situation is that the Democratic brains outnumber the Republican ones in this situation!
Evening Joyce. It has been a very positive week for dems. Thank you for your thoughts today. How fortunate we all are. It is a privilege to be here to make sense of the often nonsensical events that emerge but you inspire every day.
Such a fine column, Joyce, that actually points the way to that elusive goal of actually having civil discourse among those of different political persuasions. My challenge is to actually find those of different political persuasions, since I have painted myself into the corner of an echo chamber.